


hoping it's going to come true (but there's not a lot i can do)

by shuuuliet



Category: Psych (TV 2006)
Genre: F/M, and prior to 2x16: Shawn (and Gus) of the Dead, anyway it starts off as friendship but honestly was it ever really just that, hence the two-shot, i took a brief break from writing pining jules to write pining shawn, mentions of several 80s movies, set after 1x15: Scary Sherry: Bianca's Toast, shawn gets a bit soft here (surprising no one) but it's only because he already likes her so much, so it's very early in pre-established shules, then i remembered i only know how to write pining jules
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-29
Updated: 2020-09-04
Packaged: 2021-03-06 23:08:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,058
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26176981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shuuuliet/pseuds/shuuuliet
Summary: After the events of "Scary Sherry: Bianca's Toast", Shawn finds himself a little worried about Juliet and proposes watching a movie to distract her from the trauma. Neither expects how quickly their movie nights will become a routine, or what that may mean for them. Two-shot, set beginning just after 1x15.
Relationships: Juliet O'Hara & Shawn Spencer, Juliet O'Hara/Shawn Spencer
Comments: 12
Kudos: 25





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I saw on Tumblr ages ago (like I think years ago at this point) a little post about someone having a headcanon about Shawn and Jules watching movies together, prior to his comment on the phone to her during “Shawn (and Gus) of the Dead”, and it’s been rolling around in my head ever since. I can no longer find the post about it though, so if this was your headcanon, please let me know and I will absolutely credit you. 
> 
> The title of this work comes from the song “Breakfast in America” (1979) by Supertramp, off the album of the same name, which is one of my absolute favorite albums by anyone, ever.
> 
> I don’t own Shawn, Jules, Psych, or any of the movies mentioned in here. And technically (as mentioned above) I guess I don’t own this idea, either, although all of the execution and writing is mine. 
> 
> Oh, and I guess spoiler alert if you've never seen "Top Gun", but I feel like the statute of limitations has kind of run out on spoiler alerts for that movie, seeing as it came out in 1986. Still, just a heads up. 
> 
> I hope you enjoy!

Shawn’s not really sure how it happened.

Well, of course he _remembers_. He remembers everything, every moment, every movie, every conversation. But if he tried to trace how they got here from where they were, he can’t really say what changed, or when.

It all started the night they wrapped up the sorority girl case. Juliet had _seemed_ fine, as she’d driven away from Wispy Sunny Pines after turning down Shawn’s offer to join him and Gus for pizza, but Shawn had worried about her. It was a new thing for him, worrying about someone. In fact, before Jules, he couldn’t remember worrying about _anyone_ , really, except his mom in the early days after she’d left.

But he couldn’t shake it, as he sat in Gus’ apartment eating pizza. He kept seeing Jules in his head, how hard it had been to pull that axe from her hands, how her eyes had seemed so sharp, threatening, while the paleness of her face and the way she hardly seemed to realize Shawn was even _there_ revealed that beneath her exterior, beneath the self-defense skills she’d learned at the academy, she was just _scared_.

That night was the first night he’d called her.

After the pizza, he’d left Gus’ almost abruptly, and almost as soon as he opened the door to his own place, he’d had his phone pressed to his ear, the call already connecting.

She’d answered on the second ring--very clearly, as Shawn had anticipated, _not_ sleeping like she had claimed she would be. “Shawn?” she asked in confusion.

“Hi, Jules,” he said. “Did you know _Beverly Hills Cop_ is on channel seven right now?”

“You’re calling me to tell me what’s on TV?” She asks. “Shawn, you know we _all_ get the TV Guide in the paper, right?”

He sighs. “You’re right, Jules,” he says, feigning defeat. “Look, I just got a little freaked out over that case, okay? Being in that mental hospital was _creepy_ , especially after what Gus and I saw happen there, and I can’t sleep.”

“ _You_ can’t sleep?” she asks. Another question, but the confusion is gone from her voice this time. Instead, she’s incredulous.

They both know he’s calling for her.

“Like I said, I’m freaked out,” he says. “But _Beverly Hills Cop_ is on, and I’m gonna watch it, and I wouldn’t mind if you wanted to, I don’t know, stay on the line with me while I do. It might make me feel better, you know?”

“Huh.” She says, and she’s not even trying to hide her disbelief anymore. She clears her throat, and Shawn can picture what the decision looks like on her face. “Well, if you’re _really_ scared, Shawn, I guess I can do that for you. But only because it’s a great movie.”

“A classic,” he agrees.

“And I don’t want…you…to be creeped out anymore, or anything,” she adds hastily.

He smiles. “Thanks, Jules, I owe you one.”

After that, there’d been no more mentions of the case, just laughter, Eddie Murphy impressions, and a constant exchanging of commentary on the film, each trying to top the other’s narrations of what was going on on the screen.

Juliet had been silent for a few moments by the time the credits rolled, and for a second, Shawn felt a flash of worry, until he realized he could hear her breathing gently over the phone.

“Jules?” he whispered.

She made no response, and he smiled. Clearly, she’d felt safe enough, relaxed enough, to fall asleep. The worst was over. “Goodnight, Jules,” he whispered, before ending the call and heading off towards his own bed.

They hadn’t mentioned it, the next day at the station, but when he saw her as he walked in, she’d smiled softly at him, giving him a little nod, a slight blush rising in her cheeks. Her shyness in that moment endeared her to him more than he expected, and it threw him off a little bit, causing him to almost stumble right into Lassie.

“What’s wrong with you, Spencer?” Lassie demanded, jumping out of the way.

“Uh, the spirits were warning me to keep you on your toes, Lassie,” he responded. “You’re welcome.”

He didn’t need to look at Jules to know she’d understood that he was a little flustered too.

But he hadn’t expected anything to come of it, really, expecting instead that that movie night was just a one-off, almost his _duty_ , as a _friend_ , to step up for Jules. Yes, he’d been surprised by his need to comfort her, to protect her that night, but it was a one-time deal. He’d certainly never expected it to happen again.

It did, though. Two weeks after closing the sorority case, they’d all gotten involved in a drug deal gone terribly wrong, down at a warehouse by the waterfront. They’d gotten the perps, but shots had been fired, and a colleague from the SBPD had fallen, right in front of Shawn. As the coroner arrived, Shawn, Lassie, and Jules had stood around almost numbly, looking at each other. They were all shaken by it, and they all knew it.

Juliet had called Shawn that night. This time, the film was _St. Elmo’s Fire_.

They both knew that didn’t really matter, though.

Somehow, from there, they’d gone on just like that, until the calls were happening nearly every week. Somewhere along the way, they stopped bothering with excuses of being scared, an unspoken understanding that they just _wanted_ to talk, to make each other laugh, to hear each other’s voices as they fell asleep, to be together without defining it, because if you don’t call it a date, it doesn’t count, right?

Sometimes, they found themselves largely ignoring the movie, and Shawn was surprised by how easy it was to talk to her. He liked making her laugh; the ripple of joy he felt wash over him every time her laughter rang through the phone surprised and thrilled him every time. He liked their other conversations, too, liked learning about Miami and her brothers and which parts of the movies they watched had been her favorite growing up, which lines made her laugh every time, how she still cried when Goose died in _Top Gun_.

(He still cried at that part, too, but he didn’t tell her so.)

They both consciously tried to steer themselves back into the movie when they got too far off-track, though. It was too dangerous, otherwise. Shawn can’t quite pinpoint the moment he realized they were spending more time getting back on track with the movie than they were actually commenting on it, but it made him smile inexplicably every time he noticed they’d worked their way off-topic yet again.

They carried on, like that, week after week, never acknowledging in the station how long they’d spent laughing the night before. It wasn’t dating, though, he reminded himself. It was _very clearly not dating_. It was two friends, together, watching movies, not even hanging out in person. And if it was getting harder for him to focus on the movies—movies he _loved_ , by the way—and harder still to see Juliet as merely a friend (they were _well past_ colleagues at this point), well, what did that matter? For now, they were friends.

After all, he reflected later, months into their movie nights, he’d never expected it to go anywhere. Well, not like this, at least. He’d never allowed himself to even _imagine_ this, Jules on his couch, her face pressed into his shoulder like it was now.

No, _this_ had come completely out of nowhere, hadn’t it?

Somehow, the previous week on the phone, he’d discovered that Juliet had never seen _The Shining_.

“Jules,” he said, “there are _absolutely_ no excuses to have not seen _The Shining_.”

“Of course there are,” she said. “I’m not a horror movie person, anyway.”

He gasped. “Jules, that’s not a _horror movie_ horror movie, it’s _The Shining_! It’s a classic! You can’t be a grown adult in this country and have just…not seen it! That’s…that’s blasphemy!”

She laughed, and Shawn could see in his head the expression she’d be wearing, the frown that had a little laughter in it, her nose scrunched up in a way that drove him absolutely crazy. “You do know that’s not even close to what blasphemy is, right?”

“Blasphemy’s not a strong enough word, then,” he retorted. “Come on, Jules, it’s _The Shining._ You’ve got to watch it with me.”

“I don’t _want_ to watch it!” she cried, laughing.

He sighs, impatient. “We’ve been over this, there’s not a _choice_ in the matter. It’s mandatory viewing.”

She laughs again.

“Look, Jules, you can’t just go around having _not_ seen it,” he says. “How would the people of Santa Barbara feel knowing one of their finest, a _public servant,_ no less, had never seen this film? I’d certainly be alarmed! In fact, I _am_ alarmed, as a citizen of Santa Barbara. What are they _teaching_ you in the academy, anyway?”

“I’m sure _the people of Santa Barbara_ can put on their big-boy pants and get over it,” she comments drily.

“Maybe,” he says, “but that’s not something you want to mess with, Jules. And besides, what if _I_ can’t get over it, being rejected by you like this?”

Juliet pauses, perhaps for just a beat too long, and Shawn knows she’s wondering what he meant, exactly, by his choice of words. He’s not entirely sure what he meant, either, but her answer somehow feels really important.

“It really means that much to you?” She asks, and the teasing is still present in her voice, but a little less, somehow, than it had been a moment before.

“It’s practically a federal law,” he answers. _Don’t get too serious. This is about the movie._

She sighs. “Fine, the next time it’s on, you can call me.”

“Oh no,” he says, “that’s not a phone movie, that’s an in-person movie. I’m not gonna _not_ be there for your inaugural viewing.”

She laughs again, giving in easier than he thought she would. “You’re on.”

And now here they were. They’d started out on separate sides of the couch, Juliet holding one of Shawn’s pillows in her lap. She needed something to hold onto, during scary movies, she’d explained, and though Shawn had immediately opened up his arms in response, she’d rolled her eyes, instead picking up the pillow and showing it to him in an exaggerated motion.

As it turned out, though, Juliet was _very much_ not a horror movie person, and as the movie had gone on, somehow she and Shawn had gotten closer and closer together, neither of them acknowledging it, but neither of them minding.

By halfway through the movie, Juliet is hugging Shawn’s arm in addition to the pillow on her lap, turning her face and pressing it into his shoulder every time she gets scared. Shawn stays perfectly still whenever she does this, not wanting to startle her away, while he silently prays that the movie will be even scarier than he remembers, and maybe then he can just slip his arm around her, pull her into his chest instead of just into his shoulder. Maybe then, it won’t be a big deal if he holds her, grabs her hand, makes this movie night…well, maybe not the _last_ in-person one.

For now, though, it’s enough, her letting him this close. It’s enough to see how cute she is, as she pulls back from her grip on him, turns her face towards him in awe. “ _How_ are you not terrified right now?” She asks.

He laughs, but before he can answer, a psychotic Jack is hacking his way through the door on-screen.

Juliet gives a little yelp and hides her face behind the pillow she’d been holding on her lap.

“Jules,” he says, a little laughter in his voice, “you see scarier stuff than this _every day_.”

“It’s different,” she mumbles, her response muffled behind the pillow she’s holding in front of her face.

“How? If anything, this should be _less_ scary, since you know it’s just a movie!”

She takes the pillow that’s covering her face away for a second to give him a _look_ , and she’s so cute he almost can’t stand it. “It just _is_ , okay?”

Without thinking about it, he brushes her hair back from her face where it’s fallen into her eyes as she’d given him side-eye, tucking it behind her ear. He’s not exactly _surprised_ by the gesture—it’s not like this is the first time he’s been tempted to run his fingers through Juliet’s hair—but it was completely involuntary, and he’s not sure how to read her expression as she looks at him. He hadn’t _meant_ to touch her so overtly, and her wide eyes confirm that she hadn’t expected him to.

He’s struck for a moment by how pretty she is. She’s always beautiful, of course, any idiot can see that, but sometimes it just _hits_ him, and he’s always thrown a little off balance when it does. So he backs off, the right choice, consciously steering them away from the road his unintentional action could have taken them down, a road he’s not ready to admit he might want to take, and one he’s not at all certain she’s okay with. He clears his throat, dropping his hand, not looking at her.

She looks down for a minute, blushing, and then—thankfully—the action picks back up on screen and she’s absorbed back into it, but all Shawn can think about is her shoulder that he can feel pressed against his, how her hand is just inches away, how they’re so close but they’re just _not ready_ and he knows it, and he wants to respect it, but at this moment, it is _not easy_.

Somehow, in a blur, they make it through the rest of the movie, Juliet keeping her head in the pillow at all the scary moments now, never returning her face to Shawn’s shoulder. She lets their arms stay pressed against each other, though, and he’s not sure what to make of that.

As the credits play, she looks at him, her face still pale. “Well,” she says, “we are _never_ watching that again.”

He laughs. “It’ll grow on you,” he says. “An American classic.”

“By _whose_ standards?” She asks, throwing her hands in the air. “There is not a chance _in hell_ that I am ever going to watch any _part_ of that again.”

He smiles. “Come on,” he says, nudging her as he stands up from the couch, “we’re going for pancakes.”

“Pancakes?” she asks, glancing at her watch. “Shawn, it’s late.”

“First of all, late is the ideal time for pancakes,” he says, “everyone knows the best time to go to a diner is the middle of the night. And second, what, are you kidding me, Jules? Like you’re going to be able to sleep _now_?”

She purses her lips, considering. “Fair point.”

He holds out his hand to her to help her stand up from her burrow of pillows on the couch, and she takes it. If Shawn was unprepared for the feeling of touching her hair, touching her hand is somehow so much worse. The spark of contact at her hand in his is too much, somehow, and he almost drops her hand with how unexpected it feels, and yet the _absolute last thing_ he wants to do at that moment is let her hand go.

And now he’s thrown off-kilter again (how does Juliet O’Hara _keep doing that_?!) and they’ve still got the night stretched out before them, no more possibility of couch cuddling but _also_ no movie to act as a buffer; just him and her, at a diner, in the middle of the night. He’s overwhelmed by it, how he suddenly feels like he’s in high school again, his nerves in overdrive, only this—Jules—is so much _better_ than anyone he’d imagined then, which actually makes things worse, since he’s amazed by how much he cares about this, how badly he doesn’t want to screw it up by taking things further than she’s ready for, no matter how much he wants to.

And he _does_ want to, he realizes, as he watches her pull her hair back, putting her jacket on. But that’s not what scares him. What scares him is realizing…he’s not going to coax her into this. He's going to let her take this as slowly as she wants, even though he’s starting to realize that his mental protestations against falling for her have long since lost their hold on him, his pretenses wavering every time she looked at him, every time she’d buried her head in his shoulder.

“You ready?” she asks, smiling over at him, and he’s hit again with a wave of affection for her, how she can be so beautiful at this time of night, her hair in a simple ponytail, a crease mark on her face from Shawn’s pillowcase. Oh, this is going to be much harder than he thought.

 _Pancakes?_ He thinks dazedly, almost laughing, as he watches her grab her keys. _What was I_ thinking?


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After the movie night, Shawn and Juliet go to get some pancakes, each trying to convince themselves that doing so does NOT constitute a date.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As usual, I don’t own Shawn, Jules, or Psych. There’s also a momentary Biblical allusion in here, and I feel completely confident saying that I also cannot claim ownership of The Bible. 
> 
> Hope you enjoy these babies feeling things they’re not ready to feel! Let’s get these kids some pancakes, shall we?

Juliet’s not quite sure how they got here. It’s been a weird night.

All night, the air has felt charged with some kind of tension, excitement, almost, and not just because she can still feel her heart racing a little from watching _The Shining_. (Scary movies really _are_ awful, how does anyone find those fun to watch?)

She can feel Shawn’s eyes on her as she fixes her hair into a ponytail, pulls on her jacket, trying her best to look unflustered.

“You ready?” she asks, turning towards him.

“Can I drive?” he responds.

“On your bike? No way.”

(It’s a little tempting, though, she has to admit, the idea of riding on Shawn’s motorcycle with him, but right now, it’s probably the bad idea to end all bad ideas, after the evening they’ve just had, in which she somehow found herself snuggling into him on his couch, the gesture thinly excused by her fear of the movie. No, now is decidedly _not_ the time to ride his bike with him, the idea of having to wrap her arms around him like that, tempting as it may be, is much more than she feels ready for.)

He shakes his head. “Not on my bike, it’s too chilly out there. We can take your car.”

“You want to drive my car?” Now she’s just confused.

“Well,” he shrugs nonchalantly. “I know where the pancakes are.”

“Shawn, I didn’t _just_ move here,” she says, “I know where to find pancakes.”

“But not the _best_ pancakes,” he argues, and he looks so determined that she almost laughs.

Instead, she just raises her eyebrow at him.

“Come on,” he says, “don’t you trust me, Jules?”

 _Not anymore_ , she thinks, idly, a response to a different question than the one he’s asking. _And I don’t trust me, either. Not right now, not when I’m pretty sure we both want something we shouldn’t have._

She sighs, hands him her keys, trying not to dwell on the feeling of the brush of his fingers against her palm as he grabs them.

They head out to the car, and she tries to ignore the thrill that’s running through her. They’ve left his house, but she can still feel something, a shift in the air of some kind. She wonders if Shawn feels it, too, if he’s still reeling from her hand in his as he’d pulled her up from the couch, like she is, or from the way he’d brushed her hair back during the movie.

She thinks back to that moment, how her breath had hitched as he leaned that close to her, hoping for... _something_ , though she couldn’t quite articulate what. She’d prayed he didn’t notice how uneven her breathing had been, though his face had been so close to hers she was sure he could feel it, as surely as she could feel his.

He hadn’t meant to brush her hair back like that, she was sure of it. She had seen it on his face—he had been as surprised by it as she was. And that had given her pause, stopped her from giving over to the sudden impulse she’d had in that moment, which was to lean forward and press her lips against his, finally transform this dance they’d been doing around whatever this was into something concrete.

But then he’d pulled back, and so had she, confused by his hesitancy—it wasn’t like Shawn to be hesitant—and even more confused by the way she could still feel his fingers, where they’d brushed against her forehead, the contact resulting in an ache she couldn’t quite place. His hand had lingered in her hair for longer than it should have; he’d taken his time to sweep the unruly lock behind her ear, then let his hand drop just so, until it was almost cupping her cheek.

That was when he’d looked shocked and dropped his hand, like he’d been caught, somehow, but she wasn’t sure what it was that flashed in his eyes, surprise mixed with…fear? Maybe? And yet something about his gaze in that moment, before he hastily cleared his throat and looked away, seemed to match the yet-undetermined ache she felt, the feeling that had come when she’d first felt the burn of his fingers on her face, and which was now settling somewhere deeper, in her chest.

It's not like they haven’t touched before; Shawn dances around the station offering fist bumps to practically everyone, after all, and Juliet has been the recipient on several occasions. It always means nothing—Shawn even offers Carlton fist bumps on rare occasions, though he usually responds with an eye roll and never takes him up on them. And there have been other moments, here and there, Shawn leaning over her as she looks something up for a case on her computer so that his arm rests against her shoulder, or an elbow in the ribs to get her attention so he could mutter a one-liner or pass her some funny note during long briefings; and once, when she’d stopped momentarily to pull her heels off before chasing a suspect through a field, and he’d reached out and thrown his arm around her, catching her when she almost fell over—yes, there have been plenty of times they’ve touched, and it’s not like she’s _oblivious_ , she’s noticed them, but they were…different. They were different than today.

She can’t decide exactly what made today _feel_ so different. Maybe it’s that it was just the two of them, alone together, no watchful eyes like there always are at the station. Maybe it’s the way he’d been so gentle, his movements so much more intentional than a casual fist bump or elbow to the ribs. Maybe it’s that he’s not really teasing her anymore, shifting his tone away from the flirty one he used to use into something decidedly more _real_. Or maybe, if she’s actually honest with herself, it’s the fact that she _wants_ it to be different, or at least she thinks she does. She’s felt the walls she put up to keep Shawn away crumble away over the last several weeks, starting with the very first night he’d called her and disappearing in quick succession afterward, every joke he’d made just for her or knowing glance at her at work when they’d spent hours talking the night before like a trumpet blast at Jericho.

The walls are nearly gone altogether now, but she’s not sure she’s ready for them to be. She’s still decently new here, and she’s just starting to get to be lead detective on more cases, and the thought of trying to navigate the way things are shifting at work with the complication of dating a consultant makes her palms start to sweat.

(Not that they weren’t sweating before, seeing as she’s now sitting next to Shawn as he drives her car, which suddenly seems much smaller than the saleswoman at Volkswagen had boasted when she’d bought it, but still.)

She shakes her head slightly to clear it. No, this isn’t a good idea. They’re not ready. _She’s_ not ready. She may like him—how much, she’s not sure, but certainly much more than she’d ever imagined she would and, frankly, much more than she’s willing to honestly think about right now—but they can’t go down this road, not now.

(Even if that road, with its kind hazel eyes and amused, mischievous smile is incredibly tempting at this particular moment.)

She’d pulled her hair back into a ponytail before they’d left his house, hoping that would make the feeling of the burn of his hand against her skin dissipate. It doesn’t help much, though; she can still recall with perfect clarity the feel of his fingers in her hair, on her cheek, and she wonders how she managed to memorize the way it felt in a matter of seconds.

Juliet is too distracted in the car to notice where they’re going, at first, and it’s only when they’re pulling close to the Psych office that she realizes which diner Shawn must be taking her to.

But there it is, sure enough, and it’s all coming back. _You’re in my seat._ Her first case, first real taste of detective work. _First time pulling your gun?_ It’s funny how her hands are shaking more now, on returning here with him, than they possibly could have that day.

She wonders if Shawn is remembering it too, their first meeting. Although, knowing him, he’s probably just thinking about the crawling snake he left unfinished.

She tries to keep her face neutral as they enter the diner, not wanting to betray her memory of this place, in case he doesn’t remember. 

“You wanna sit at our spot?” he asks.

“Our spot?”

He nods, gestures to the end of the counter, and she almost laughs. Okay, so he _is_ remembering their first meeting, just as she is.

“Of course, we can’t exactly _both_ sit in our spot, and technically the stool was mine first, so it’s still kind of _my_ spot, but you did claim it…” Shawn is rambling, but she doesn’t mind. It’s kind of endearing, how much thought he’s putting into it.

Endearing? Oh, this is hopeless.

“I mean, I guess technically we _could_ both sit in our spot at the same time,” he continues, winking at her.

She blushes but rolls her eyes at him. “ _Shawn.”_

Now that she looks at it, the stools are too close together, anyway. It wouldn’t be any better—any safer—than the couch had been, and it’s a really bad idea to get that close to Shawn. Especially now, when he’s been so sweet, and she’s no longer at all sure of her ability to spurn his advances, seeing as she’s already struggling to remind herself of the reasons this whole thing is a bad idea at all.

She points towards an open booth along the wall, and he follows her without hesitation. “You’ve got to get the boysenberry pancakes,” he says as they slide in across from each other. “It’s the only choice.”

“Boysenberry?” She asks. “Not pineapple?”

Shawn gives a heavy, dramatic sigh. “They don’t _have_ pineapple pancakes here, and it’s lame, and I’ve asked about it a hundred times. I even told them I’d circulate a petition in the community but they still won’t add them to the menu.”

She shakes her head in sympathy. “The world can be so _cruel_.”

He laughs. “The boysenberry pancakes will knock your socks off, though, Jules. I promise.”

They do. The pancakes are thick, bursting with berries, and it’s too rich for this time of night, but she indulges anyway. They come with a thick berry compote, which will probably stain her lips, she thinks, but she can’t worry about that right now, not with pancakes this incredible in front of her.

Shawn watches her as she takes her first bite. “Unbelievable, aren’t they?”

She merely sighs in contentment in response and he nods. “Pretty much.”

After a while, the pancakes get the best of her, though, and she puts her fork down. Shawn’s nearly finished his, and she wonders for the millionth time how he and Gus are possibly able to eat as much as they do. She watches him for a second, something endearing about his excitement over something as simple as pancakes.

After a moment, he looks up at her. “Uh, Jules,” he says, “you’ve got a little stain from the boysenberry, right here.” He lifts his hand to his own lower lip to show her.

“Oh, thanks,” she says, rubbing at it. “Did I get it?”

He shakes his head, amusement in his eyes.

She rubs at it again. “Now?”

He shakes his head again, but the look in his eyes changes. He clears his throat, looking almost nervous. “Um…let me?”

She nods, mutely, and her heart is racing a million times a minute as he reaches forward, leaning across the table slowly, almost hesitantly, before rubbing the pad of his thumb back and forth along the side of her bottom lip and against the corner of her mouth, gently.

It feels like an hour passes before he pulls his hand away, and Juliet is almost certain she doesn’t breathe once during that time. She stares at him, knowing that any hope of _not_ looking completely flustered is a lost cause.

Shawn stares back at her, his eyes wide, his face as flushed as hers feels, his mouth hanging open just slightly, like he’s shocked at the intimacy of his touch, shocked that she’s letting him be this close.

“There,” he says gently, his voice hoarse, barely a whisper, his breathing almost ragged, “got it.”

“Thanks,” she whispers back, hearing the unevenness of her own voice. She tears her eyes away from his, forcing herself to look down at her plate; it’s too much, it’s not enough, she’s not ready but she _is_.

 _Pancakes?_ she thinks dazedly, as she feels Shawn’s knee brush up against hers under the table. _What was I_ thinking _?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There you have it! I hope you enjoyed this piece (it might be one of my favorites I’ve written so far), and thanks so so much for reading. As always, any feedback is welcomed and appreciated!

**Author's Note:**

> I still struggle so much with writing Shawn, so the second half of this two-shot will be in my comfort zone, which is writing Jules. Also, I know I’ve mentioned Shawn and Jules going for pancakes in another fic, and I really can’t explain why I’m so into that. 
> 
> As always, comments are so very much appreciated, especially since, like I said, writing Shawn is always hard and terrifying for me, haha. Thank you so so much for reading, and I hope you’ll look out for part two!


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